DrOliver's code works for me in IE5, Mozilla and Opera (but not Netscape4). Which browser are you using? Maybe you could use a non-breaking space, "&nbsp;", but it looks like it shouldn't be necessary...

In terms of getting the space to appear cross-browser, how about adding some padding-right for the H element?

Logically an H tag marks the header for content that follows it - but not for the preceding content. That holds true no matter how you set the visual rendering rules.

So, depending on the content involved, I'd say this might be a "correct" use of the H tag. But I'd be very careful about how you execute. A run-in head can be very useful, but using the H tag for phrases that have both preceding text and following text seems odd to me.

Certainly, don't pepper the page with these run-in H tags around every one of your keywords. If everything's in an H tag, it can be like NOTHING's in an H tag. The best bet is to use H tags to highlight the page's logical structure.

Thanks for the feedback. My original intention was to try and benefit from the perceived advantage for <H1> on my key phrases without seeing any difference when viewing the page. It appears however that doing this is likely to be penalised by certain search engines so my strategy may be not to proceed. Just trying to find a way to get back up the Google rankings as I have dropped sooooo far in the last couple of months without employing any dodgy methods. If you can't beat em ......

My original intention was to try and benefit from the perceived advantage for <H1> on my key phrases without seeing any difference when viewing the page.

I think this all gets back to the three most important aspects of SEO - content, content, and content.

If you plan your content carefully - with thought to SEO - you will be able to use those H1 tags appropriately, and not as the tag equivalent of hidden text.

We do use CSS to maintain control of the size of the tag - standard H1 is way larger than anything we normally use - but it can be worked in as the header to the main body of text. So if your keywords are appropriate as the headline on the page, you can easily use H1. If your keywords are NOT appropriate as part of the page headline, maybe a little re-write is in order.

It does making planning a page a little more difficult - but I think you will find the effort worthwhile.